Qatar

A group of Middle Eastern affairs experts advised lawmakers to adopt legislation aimed at tempering the United States’ recent renewed support for Saudi Arabia at a House Foreign Affairs committee hearing on Tuesday.

A percolating crisis in the Middle East over a top U.S. military ally’s support for extremist terror groups was ignited by President Donald Trump’s demand that U.S. allies in the Arab world end their support for Islamic extremism, according to senior U.S. officials familiar with the situation.

The Trump administration is offering to mediate a percolating crisis in the Middle East that has seen several key Arab nations break relations with Qatar, a top U.S. military ally that has played a central role in American counter-terrorism operations, according to multiple U.S. officials who spoke to the Washington Free Beacon about the situation.

The Arab world’s strongest powers cut ties with Qatar on Monday over alleged support for Islamists and Iran, re-opening a festering wound just two weeks after U.S. President Donald Trump’s demand for Muslim states to fight terrorism.

The U.S. ambassador to Qatar, an Obama administration holdover whose family donated hundreds of thousands to the Obama campaign, signaled her distaste for working under President Donald Trump, raising questions about her commitment to the new administration.

A group of Persian Gulf states denounced legislation passed by the U.S. Congress last week that would allow the families of Sept. 11 victims to sue the Saudi Arabian government over its alleged links to terrorism.

The Obama administration is facing criticism over what some lawmakers allege is an overly permissive attitude toward terrorism financing by foreign nations, according to new congressional communication obtained by the Washington Free Beacon that presses U.S. officials to hold these nations accountable enabling terror.

The Brookings Institution will not hold its annual Doha energy conference this year amid reports that Qatar and other petroleum-rich countries are cutting spending due to the global oil market collapse.

Brookings, a Washington-based think tank that received nearly $4 million from the Qatar government in 2015, according to disclosure reports, declined to give a reason for why the conference is not being held this year.